v0.29.3 - Quests and Beta Localization

[p]This is yet another minor patch while the next big patch is still cooking something big and yummy.[/p][p]There are tons of bug fixes, performance optimizations, Quest system improvements and new tutorial quests, but also a Beta release of Localization.[/p][p][/p][h3]Quests[/h3][p]So far there have not been any in-game help what to do except discovering things yourself. And finally we have a new quest chain that takes your thru the most important steps (building a house, marriage and conquering settlements).[/p][p][/p][p]The quest system has also been heavily updated and modified like better cleanup of spawned things and better failed/abort handling.[/p][p][/p][p]There is also new events sent when quests progress, or are added to Player. Almost all quests and events have had updates and fixes.[/p][p][/p][h3]BETA Localization - Phase I[/h3][p]This has been something that was planned to wait until production phase is further along. But we now have a full translation pipeline established with Unreal Engine where new texts can automatically be translated. So it is time to start releasing the changes now. [/p][p]Next up will be to create a tool for handling human correction authority and minor changes to Dialogues to be better cut into paragraphs. [/p][p]Changing language can already be tested in Options -> Game -> Language [/p][p]Currently it is not 100% complete but will be coming patches (and change font to support Chinese and Russian characters natively). The supported languages for now are: [/p]

• [p]English[/p]
• [p]Spanish[/p]
• [p]French[/p]
• [p]German[/p]
• [p]Chinese (need special font installed)[/p]
• [p]Russian (need special font installed)[/p]

[p][/p][h3]Important fixes to mention[/h3]

• [p]Optimization round for Stones and Mountains placed in levels, now instanced static meshes[/p]
• [p]Fixed a random head bug for soldiers[/p]
• [p]1h (no shield) Right attack is fixed and not so short[/p]
• [p]Fixed updating follower counter when recruiting them on the road[/p]
• [p]Character Creation panels now show Avatar in fixed position and during the whole flow[/p]
• [p]Undeads got OnHit cooldown[/p]
• [p]Fixed a hard cut in music when changing Terrain on World Map[/p]
• [p]Character Panel and Settlement UI now use ESC better to step back and close[/p]
• [p]Character Panel got a new closing sound[/p]
• [p]New hit animations as interrupt when hit for all characters with a cooldown of 2s[/p]
• [p]World Events for quests now show Task description instead of Quest description[/p]
• [p]Fixed a broken Temple Dungeon in Desert with bad navigation[/p]
• [p]Fixed Player camera at start position when coming back to World Map[/p]
• [p]Combat healing got new floating icon and better abort logic[/p]
• [p]Fixed Minotaurs attacks[/p]
• [p]Fixed World Events showing big ui widget to queue them and pause in multiplayer when Player opens other UI (time stil goes on in multiplayer)[/p]

[p][/p][h3]Next Major Patch[/h3][p]There are several projects going on in parallell now. AI is helping to build a lot of code and tools that are needed (translation pipeline for example).[/p][p]And to prepare for expanding the studio I have created several AI agents that fill certain roles. For example there is already a Project Manager AI running the Trello board, keeping track of what changes in Progress and comments on tickets. It has deep understanding of Birthright as a project and what plugins and technologies it is built on.[/p][p]Because of this new AI help with deeper technical discussions, and super fast probing of Unreal Engine source files, the foundation of a new battle character structure that is very optimized is on it's way.[/p][p][/p][p]So for the next Major patch it will include a new completely custom built character used in Combat, for superior scalability.[/p][p]Unreal Engines Mass Entity system is fully used both for custom Movement pathfinding and full AI multi-threaded batch processing. Removing most of the CPU bottlenecks currently in game.[/p][p]
While the plan is still to use Skeleton Meshes for Players and Humanoids/Monsters (might change in future), for Undeads the plan is to use VAT (Vertex Animated Textures).
Currently Horses use VAT to remove the cost of Skeletons and Animations.[/p][p]For Undeads this would mean they can scale up to massive amounts and be more of a zerg than armies.[/p][p][/p][p]This is an exiting project cooking and very much needed for performance in larger Battles and Sieges. And of course multiplayer replication is a core of it, much more performant though and with new better ways to solve things.[/p]